


These Troublesome Disguises (Don't Let Yourself Grow Hungry Now Remix)

by chantefable



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-24
Updated: 2017-09-24
Packaged: 2018-12-26 07:29:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12054210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chantefable/pseuds/chantefable
Summary: “Off the record, then.”Freddie's voice is dry like the desert, and when Margot turns to her, the narrow limits of the bedroom are momentarily expanded, walls and furniture sloshing like wine in a glass, and an arid, barren land stretches between the two of them, eager to swallow up more.





	These Troublesome Disguises (Don't Let Yourself Grow Hungry Now Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Petronia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Petronia/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Don't Let Yourself Grow Hungry Now](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3253028) by [Petronia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Petronia/pseuds/Petronia). 



...and eased the putting off  
these troublesome disguises which we wear.  
John Milton

…men ought either to be well treated or crushed, because  
they can avenge themselves of lighter injuries, of more serious ones they cannot;  
therefore the injury that is to be done to a man ought to be of such a kind that one does not stand in fear of revenge.  
Niccolò Machiavelli

***

Margot claws her way out from under the cotton sheet that suddenly feels too heavy. She gets up and walks across the room barefoot, leaving the bed a mess, gaping like a maw with Freddie still in it.

Her eyes are fixed on the window. Abject pining for release which would be more than temporary: few things are as permanent as that.

June swells and lingers, gorged on bright black nights and starlight, bloated with ripening on the crest of midsummer; a symphony of warmth, a crescendo of heat, a buzzing of bees and a whispering of the grass: adagio. And nothing sounds more like music than swallowed gasps and choking noises, the friction of the flesh and involuntary squeals. June is sticky and slick with sweat, heavy with the expectation of hay. June barely breathes at all, and yet it is thrumming, humming, the birds, the insects, the small animals making themselves known in the fields. The very soil tears itself asunder under the horses' hooves, bursts forth with worms and warm life.

She feels ousted from all that, dispossessed. Suspended somewhere in the winter of her mind, where the cold is brutal like a blade in the gut; stranded in the snowed in field marred by tracks, reaching for a frozen little body of a fox curled up tight. As if it were trying to be unobtrusive even in death, to make its passing inconspicuous and evade further hurt. The body was frozen solid, the animal's fur matted and bleak, its head tucked into tail, its eyes closed against the reality: there would be no more hurt. Nothing was ever going to hurt more than this. There was nothing left to be afraid of.

She remembers it vividly whereas entire days, entire weeks remain dimmed and half-forgotten, blurred together. The pain in her arm and the healing; the desire to see Mason dead, burning bright in the quick of her; Mason not dying, after all. The need to breathe and the need to ride; the strength of the animal under her, its warmth and breathing more real than her own, and her living vicariously through her horse (again, again); the crisp bite of a frosty morning on her cheeks. 

Cold, slithering. Pain, forever curved and coiled in the pit of her stomach. 

Her recollection of those months is hazy and disjointed; only the ghost of cold and numbness is distinct, more alive than the living and freely inhabiting her body.

June screams outside the window. She draws her rose-colored dressing gown close, ties it tight, like a flesh-eating plant hiding her secret in the curve of the petals.

Standing there and watching her reflection gaze back at her, trapped in the window pane, Margot feels little bravery left.

“You can show me, you know.” Freddie's voice rings sharp, an alarm bell. Margot is not alarmed. The reflection gives her a smile, tiny and serpentine.

“It's all right. I do not judge.” It's Freddie again, insistent like a bell tolling, unaware that centuries have passed in the seconds Margot has been ignoring her, unconcerned.

“I am not worried about your judgment.” Judgment, or politeness, or propriety, or piety; the smile remains frozen on Margot's face, and sweat has cooled in the curve of her spine, on her breasts and her thighs, covered and hidden away. Her skin itches slightly.

“Off the record, then.” Freddie's voice is dry like the desert, and when Margot turns to her, the narrow limits of the bedroom are momentarily expanded, walls and furniture sloshing like wine in a glass, and an arid, barren land stretches between the two of them, eager to swallow up more. 

Freddie is naked and watching her with undiminished attention, a fox in the bedsheets, in Margot's own den. There hasn't been anything subdued about her curiosity, about her hunger which has nothing to do with intimacy. It is as lush and vivid as her red hair or June outside the window; a counterpoint to the haunting cold and unshed layers of guile. 

They lock eyes.

Few things are off the record, one way or another. And much as Margot wants to cut off Freddie's access to Mason, to make sure the investigation dries up, to strangle Freddie if it is necessary to keep up appearances – she is mindful of what a careless word or a rash action might spell out. Particularly now, when Margot still needs time in order to decide what she really desires – what shall lead her out of the thickening twilight of her current life.

Margot may wish to lash out and interfere; she may wish to burrow in deep and hide. Whatever it is that flickers in her mind, Margot must stop the inner stirring of horror and doubt that comes at the very thought of anyone prying and prodding; she must obfuscate her failed plans and unformed ones. 

And Freddie, even if there are some things she is not going to tell, Freddie is going to keep digging.

Margot crosses the room again, feeling warmer with every step. When Freddie is under her again, breathing, twisting, pulling Margot closer, she feels momentarily more present. 

There will be time to figure out what she wants later, and what she wants from Dr Lecter, and how it can be achieved: to seek out the exquisite taste of knowledge. And, unfortunately, there will be time for Freddie to ponder Margot's yearnings and whether she can gamble for a chance plant her own paradise and water it with Mason's blood. But for now, Margot puts a stop to Freddie's tacit inquiries, puts it with a hand gripping her hip and a palm cupping her breast. Freddie tries to keep asking but the questions dry up as their bodies become more entwined, as Margot nips her shoulder, her neck, her breast.

Freddie's mouth is keen and her touch predatory, and when Margot lets Freddie pull on the silk sash and sheds the dressing gown, pressing Freddie into the bed with the length of her bared body, she can feel herself soaking up shameless life, and recklessness, and unrestrained valor.

She stores them for later, preserved amidst wintry cruelty and contemplation.


End file.
